With his lease at the quaint, 1946-era French Provencal building in downtown Montclair Village expiring at the end of August, Vortriede elected to sell the restaurant rather than renew. It marks the end of the line for what has been a popular destination for upscale California cuisine within the tight-knit neighborhood nestled in the Oakland hills.

“The ten year mark snuck up on us,” says the 57-year-old Vortriede, a Le Cordon Bleu–trained chef and longtime Montclair resident. “My wife Kathleen and I made the decision to let someone else have all the fun.”

So who will be having that fun? Vortriede had several offers, he says, but elected to sell the business to another Montclair couple, Joe Schnell and Tracey Belock. They’ll take over in six to eight weeks, likely in early September, whereupon the bistro will close for a remodel and open back up as Chowhaus.

(Schnell and Belock apparently don’t plan to take over the adjacent banquet room, which will likely revert back to retail use.)

Henry and Kathleen Vortriede

Vortriede described the new restaurant as as a breakfast-through-dinner, farm-to-fork concept serving new American cuisine. Belock was the opening chef at the now-shuttered Disco Volante and most recently served as executive chef at Tribune Tavern in downtown Oakland.

But in the meantime, don’t expect Montclair Bistro to go out with a whimper. Vortriede says he still plans on hosting his 84th and final wine dinner, featuring Rombauer Vineyards, on August 25.

And he has no intention of letting the quality slip one bit during the closing weeks. Just the opposite, in fact.

“I’ve rallied the staff and we want to continue to improve the food and service so that the day we close, we are a couple notches above where we are now,” he says. “That is our goal.”